“As a doctor, I felt helpless dealing with the child abuse cases. I did not know how to interact with the victims or which forums to approach for support.” says Dr Mona Habib, a young and passionate medical practitioner at the District Headquarters Hospital (DHQ) in Kasur – the historic town known for being the eternal abode…
“Not this time!”, said Ashraf Ghani resolutely responding to a fellow villager who had reached his home amidst heavy rain in the middle of the night to see if he could do something to avoid the usual damage such rains brought upon their village Hafizabad – prone to heavy rains, flash floods, and landslides. Their…
“After installation of the solar power units in our community, our income has increased. We are saving money because ofa concept that was unknown to us, just a few months ago. This has also provided us an opportunity to save our traditional skill: “ralli-making”, Chatoon said excitedly. Chatoon is a leader of 30-odd household village,…
It is past sunset in Barra Banda village, District Torghar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Each house is glowing with a luminous bulb, which makes this small settlement of 55 households look like a constellation of stars with dark mountains in the background. Aslam Khan, a student of seventh grade, lives in one of these star-like houses. He…
“There was no loss of life and property and we were able to put out the fire. We prevented a catastrophe before it was too late,” Ghulam Ishaq recalls proudly. “Fire brigade was late in coming to the incident site, but our ERT was in place and each member knew what to do and how…
“Every month people came knocking my door, asking for money I owed them. I had the tailoring skills, but I was not an efficient worker due to ongoing house chores and regular load shedding. Though I had developed a customer base, I had to turn away a majority of them as I could not manage…
Phulana, a 37-year-old mother of five children, is a scheduled caste Hindu who lives in ghettoized Ghera Basti in Hyderabad, Sindh. Her community is discriminated against by Muslims and upper-caste Hindus alike. Abject poverty and a lack of economic opportunities have made their lives considerably hard. Given the hardships, the family resorted to collecting used…
Sharmeen, a university student doing her Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Education, lives with her parents and siblings in Okara, a remote district of Punjab. Being a student, she frequently browses the internet for academic pursuits and to connect with her friends and mentors through social media platforms. Although, she was cognizant of the risks associated…
Mohammad Khalid, a 39-year-old social worker, belongs to village Talagram, a region surrounded by mountains, which receives heavy rainfall in both the summer and winter season. The village is only accessible through a jeepable 90-minute drive up a steep and narrow winding road from Muzaffarabad, Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK). AJK is highly prone to…
Gulshat cannot have it better. In a matter of few months, she is expecting to earn more money, have greater control over her natural and financial resources, a relatively less laborious summer and abundance of preserved fruit and vegetables for her family to survive the harshest of winters in Chinar – a rugged village cradled…